Director of Rugby Alan Solomons spoke to the media today ahead of Friday night’s pre-season clash with Benetton Rugby at Stadio di Monigo (kick-off 8.30pm local, 7.30pm BST).
Here’s what he had to say:
Benetton/team news
- We’ll take 28 players to Italy and the aim is to get them all playing 40 minutes of rugby.
- Benetton are a good, physical side.
- The match will give us an idea of where we are.
- Ben Te’o, Josh Adams and Jack Singleton won’t be involved.
- Bryce Heem, Ethan Waller and Wynand Olivier are recovering well from operations and should hopefully be back for the start of the season.
Jono Lance
- He only finished the Super Rugby season in July so he needed a couple of weeks off after that as he went there straight from his spell here at Sixways.
- We are working with him separately now after he arrived at the start of August and getting him up to speed.
- He will be integrated into the squad gradually and it’s a similar situation with the likes of Josh Adams and Jack Singleton who have been away this summer on international duty.
- Jono is a very useful player who can play at 10, 12 and 15 – having played at 15 for some of the recent Super Rugby campaign.
Hartpury pre-season clash
- We will hopefully look at Josh Adams and Jack Singleton for that match.
Birmingham Moseley potential fixture
- I am in talks with Simon Cross at Moseley and we are hopeful of a game in a couple of weeks’ time.
The first block of Premiership games
- The first block will allow opportunities for all fit players to show what they can do.
- We have six Premiership games while there are four Premiership Rugby Shield games so there will be plenty of opportunities.